Hey all,

Just thought I would post my recent experiences with Orcon here in the hopes that someone could give me some advice.

I have been with Orcon for several years now, been relatively happy, performance speedwise goes up and down but I can live that, not the end of the world. 

Come to roughly mid November last year, I was in the process of moving to a new home just prior to preparing to go overseas for 6 weeks. So I organise  transfer order to the new property, where the owners were splitting the property in to two dwellings (2 remaining members of their family in a part of the house, the other section being rented to myself). I find out to my delight that the property owners have not split the services, ie. phone, water services etc are all still connected as if it were one dwelling. Running out of time to sort out things as my flight overseas approaches, I send an email to Orcon support:



"My name is XXX, my account name is XXX. I would like to cancel the order broadband order number XXX. I have just moved house to a new rented property, to which I have found the owners currently have relatives flatting on the same property. I found out yesterday that services are currently shared between my utilities and the other people flatting on the property.



 The owners have said they are organising a splitting of the services, but really have just stuffed me around quite a bit, and I will be out of the country for about 6 weeks from this Sunday onwards, thus not being around to sort issues out for setting this up. This will only be temporary, and I will be setting my Orcon account back up once I am back in the country.



 If there are any concerns or queries regarding this, please call me on XXX XXXXX before Sunday 21st November."


Support replied with a roger that:

"Thank you for your email regarding your account.
From your email I understand you would like to cancel order xxxx as you no longer need the services.

I have checked the order for you and requested it to be canceled. If you still wish to connect when you come back, just give us a call. We might need to add another line to the property as their can only be one line per broadband connection per property, there would be installation charges if you wished to proceed. These charges range from $99.00 - $250.00.

I hope this information was helpful and if you have any other queries please do not hesitate to email me back or call me on the number below. "



 
So alright, everything is super fantastic, I go off overseas, organise renewal of service to current house at the start of January to be set up 6th Jan, arrive back on roughly 12th Jan, no service up. Tech sent out for failed install, gets it up and running on 15th Jan.

Everything runs smoothly for next 1-2 weeks, then I get an invoice for a total of $490. Confident there must be an error, I call up to resolve the issue. Will bullet point the next string of events for readings sake.

03/02/11 - Appears the line at the previous house was in fact not cancelled, and so has been getting billed since November previous year. I am told not to worry about invoice for now, will all be sorted and that the unnecessary line will be terminated.
04/02/11 - Next day, my home loses phone and net services.
- Call up again, yes the incorrect line was terminated, will have to place order for services to be set up again, call Monday to see when it will be.
07/02/11 - Call again, order may or may not have already been placed, but told it should be up coming Thursday.
10/02/11- Come to Thursday, no services. Call Orcon up again, oh the order installed the services to the wrong line. Will have to cancel that order and set up yet another order. Should be up Monday 14th Feb
14/02/11 - services are back up

Now this was extremely aggravating and a huge inconvenience, but I honestly could have gotten over it if that was that. Now come to this week, I am again moving home and so I call Orcon to place the transfer order. I am told that it can be placed but will likely be delayed by credit services until I pay the outstanding bills.

So there is a total invoice $490 from December to current time this year. Approx $130 of this is confirmed to end up being credited, with potentially Decembers bill of $136 to be credited pending team leader approval. 

This leaves roughly $230 of remaining invoice for this year that I can not understand. I have had services since the 15th of January for a total of 2.5 weeks when you consider the 1.5 weeks of downtime from silly mistakes. 

What would everyone recommend that I do? I am usually such a very patient and relaxed person but this has genuinely made me angry. 

- Should I pay the outstanding and then leave Orcon?
- Just plain leave Orcon?
- Go to the Broadband Commission or the like?

Cheers all,

Matt